Thomas Wolfe: Of Time and the River, You Can't Go Home Again & Look Homeward, Angel. Thomas Wolfe
Читать онлайн книгу.
dear,” said Laura in the moonlight, “I will wait for you forever.”
She was buried in his flesh. She throbbed in the beat of his pulses. She was wine in his blood, a music in his heart.
“He has no consideration for you or any one else,” Hugh Barton growled. He had returned late from work at his office, to take Helen home. “If he can’t do better than this, we’ll find a house of our own. I’m not going to have you get down sick on account of him.”
“Forget about it,” Helen said. “He’s getting old.”
They came out on the veranda.
“Come down tomorrow, honey,” she said to Eugene. “I’ll give you a real feed. Laura, you come too. It’s not always like this, you know.” She laughed, fondling the girl with a big hand.
They coasted away downhill.
“What a lovely girl your sister is,” said Laura James. “Aren’t you simply crazy about her?”
Eugene made no answer for a moment.
“Yes,” he said.
“She is about you. Any one can see that,” said Laura.
In the darkness he caught at his throat.
“Yes,” he said.
The moon quartered gently across heaven. Eliza came out again, timidly, hesitantly.
“Who’s there? Who’s there?” she spoke into the darkness. “Where’s ‘Gene? Oh! I didn’t know! Are you there, son?” She knew very well.
“Yes,” he said.
“Why don’t you sit down, Mrs. Gant?” asked Laura. “I don’t see how you stand that hot kitchen all day long. You must be worn out.”
“I tell you what!” said Eliza, peering dimly at the sky. “It’s a fine night, isn’t it? As the fellow says, a night for lovers.” She laughed uncertainly, then stood for a moment in thought.
“Son,” she said in a troubled voice, “why don’t you go to bed and get some sleep? It’s not good for you staying up till all hours like this.”
“That’s where I should be,” said Laura James, rising.
“Yes, child,” said Eliza. “Go get your beauty sleep. As the saying goes, early to bed and early to rise —”
“Let’s all go, then. Let’s all go!” said Eugene impatiently and angrily, wondering if she must always be the last one awake in that house.
“Why law, no!” said Eliza. “I can’t, boy. I’ve all those things to iron.”
Beside him, Laura gave his hand a quiet squeeze, and rose. Bitterly, he watched his loss.
“Good-night, all. Good-night, Mrs. Gant.”
“Good-night, child.”
When she had gone, Eliza sat down beside him, with a sigh of weariness.
“I tell you what,” she said. “That feels good. I wish I had as much time as some folks, and could sit out here enjoying the air.” In the darkness, he knew her puckering lips were trying to smile.
“Hm!” she said, and caught his hand in her rough palm. “Has my baby gone and got him a girl?”
“What of it? What if it were true?” he said angrily. “Haven’t I a right as much as any one?”
“Pshaw!” said Eliza. “You’re too young to think of them. I wouldn’t pay any attention to them, if I were you. Most of them haven’t an idea in the world except going out to parties and having a good time. I don’t want my boy to waste his time on them.”
He felt her earnestness beneath her awkward banter. He struggled in a chaos of confused fury, trying for silence. At last he spoke in a low voice, filled with his passion:
“We’ve got to have something, mama. We’ve got to have something, you know. We can’t go on always alone — alone.”
It was dark. No one could see. He let the gates swing open. He wept.
“I know!” Eliza agreed hastily. “I’m not saying —”
“My God, my God, where are we going? What’s it all about? He’s dying — can’t you see it? Don’t you know it? Look at his life. Look at yours. No light, no love, no comfort — nothing.” His voice rose frantically: he beat on his ribs like a drum. “Mama, mama, in God’s name, what is it? What do you want? Are you going to strangle and drown us all? Don’t you own enough? Do you want more string? Do you want more bottles? By God, I’ll go around collecting them if you say so.” His voice had risen almost to a scream. “But tell me what you want. Don’t you own enough? Do you want the town? What is it?”
“Why, I don’t know what you’re talking about, boy,” said Eliza angrily. “If I hadn’t tried to accumulate a little property none of you would have had a roof to call your own, for your papa, I can assure you, would have squandered everything.”
“A roof to call our own!” he yelled, with a crazy laugh. “Good God, we haven’t a bed to call our own. We haven’t a room to call our own. We have not a quilt to call our own that might not be taken from us to warm the mob that rocks upon this porch and grumbles.”
“Now, you may sneer at the boarders all you like —” Eliza began sternly.
“No,” he said. “I can’t. There’s not breath or strength enough in me to sneer at them all I like.”
Eliza began to weep.
“I’ve done the best I could!” she said. “I’d have given you a home if I could. I’d have put up with anything after Grover’s death, but he never gave me a moment’s peace. Nobody knows what I’ve been through. Nobody knows, child. Nobody knows.”
He saw her face in the moonlight, contorted by an ugly grimace of sorrow. What she had said, he knew, was fair and honest. He was touched deeply.
“It’s all right, mama,” he said painfully. “Forget about it! I know.”
She seized his hand almost gratefully and laid her white face, still twisted with her grief, against his shoulder. It was the gesture of a child; a gesture that asked for love, pity, and tenderness. It tore up great roots in him, bloodily.
“Don’t!” he said. “Don’t, mama! Please!”
“Nobody knows,” said Eliza. “Nobody knows. I need some one too. I’ve had a hard life, son, full of pain and trouble.” Slowly, like a child again, she wiped her wet weak eyes with the back of her hand.
Ah, he thought, as his heart twisted in him full of wild pain and regret, she will be dead some day and I shall always remember this. Always this. This.
They were silent a moment. He held her rough hand tightly, and kissed her.
“Well,” Eliza began, full of cheerful prophecy, “I tell you what: I’m not going to spend my life slaving away here for a lot of boarders. They needn’t think it. I’m going to set back and take things as easy as any of them.” She winked knowingly at him. “When you come home next time, you may find me living in a big house in Doak Park. I’ve got the lot — the best lot out there for view and location, far better than the one W. J. Bryan has. I made the trade with old Dr. Doak himself, the other day. Look here! What about!” She laughed. “He said, ‘Mrs. Gant, I can’t trust any of my agents with you. If I’m to make anything on this deal, I’ve got to look out. You’re the sharpest trader in this town.’ ‘Why, pshaw! Doctor,’ I said (I never let on I believed him or anything), ‘all I want is a fair return on my investment. I believe in every one making his profit and giving the other fellow a chance. Keep the ball a-rolling!’ I said, laughing as big as you please. ‘Why, Mrs. Gant!’ he said —” She was off on a lengthy divagation, recording